The Party
by centreoftheselights
Summary: James Potter learns something new about his family.


It was the last Saturday in June.

Just like they had last year, and the year before that, and the year before that, as far back as James could remember, the Potter family had piled into the car and driven for _hours_. Every year they went somewhere different, but it always seemed to be forever away.

James's mum and dad had dressed up. It was just about the only time they did, and it was very strange, seeing his dad in a suit and his mum in a black dress with makeup and jewellery on, looking strangely like a _girl_ instead of a mum. They both acted differently as well, staying strangely silent, and James was perturbed enough by the change to leave his bothersome little brother alone and sit quietly through the long ride.

When they finally arrived at their destination, James was quickly distracted by the strangeness of the building before them. It was a tall tower, perched on a hilltop, and for a moment James thought that the figure rushing out of the door must be some kind of beautiful princess.

A moment later, he recognised his parents' friend Luna. He had only met her occasionally, mostly at these parties. From what his parents said, she seemed to go travelling a lot. Far more importantly, she had two sons the exact same age as him and they were _wicked_.

"You're the first ones here!" she said once she had greeted James's parents with hugs. "The boys are out back, if you want to go find them?"

James didn't need telling twice. As fast as he could, he sprinted through to the back garden, a long, trailing strip of grass and wildflowers that ran from the very top of the hill to the river below.

"Lorcan! Lysander!"

"James!"

Before long, the trio were chasing around the twins' Snitch Trainer 3000, while Al stumbled after them, getting in the way, and Lily gleefully began smashing up flowers in a spirited attempt at the world's longest daisy chain.

Soon, the garden began to fill as more families arrived – first Rose and Hugo, James's baby cousins, then Fred and Roxanne, Molly and Lucy, Victoire, Dom and Louis –

"How many cousins do you _have_?"

"You should see Christmas at Grandma Weasley's."

Several adults briefly visited the garden as well – Grandma and Grandpa Weasley, Uncle Ron and Aunt Hermione and James's godfather Neville all said hello before disappearing inside. Teddy was even talked into playing a couple of rounds with them before he disappeared inside with his grandmother.

"_Honestly_."

"Grown ups just don't have their priorities straight."

But it wasn't just James's family, although there certainly were a lot of them. Several more groups of children had arrived who he knew only vaguely, from seeing them at other parties much like this one, and soon there were enough of them to put on a full-blown match of ground Quidditch with the help of a football and a couple of rather battered old hoops.

Slowly, the afternoon wore on, and as the excitement of seeing everyone began to wear off James grew more and more restless.

The younger kids – Al and Hugo and the rest who were young enough to still get hyperactive – were playing with the Snitch. The older lot, who had already started Hogwarts, were lazing on the top of the hill, gossiping about classes and teachers. Caught in between, the trio didn't feel like joining either group – too old to play with the babies, but still too young to join the talk about Hogwarts, even though that would be _them_ soon.

For a while, they wondered down by the river, talking about leaving school and starting Hogwarts and actually kind of cool parents and annoying siblings and omnipresent cousins and everything else that crossed their mind, until the sky was starting to grow dark and the conversation was starting to run down.

"We could skip stones…"

"No we can't." Lorcan pulled a face. "Mum Imperturbed it so the little kids can't fall in and drown."

James sighed, glancing up the hilltop at the tower. It looked more dramatic than ever against the red sunset sky.

"What do they even _do_ in there anyway?"

Lorcan shrugged.

"Dunno," Lysander agreed. "But they do it every year, don't they?"

"Wish we could find out," James sighed. What was it that made today of all days so special?

The twins exchanged a glance. "Why don't we?"

"Go peer in the window?" James had considered it before, but "All the older kids will see us."

"They will up there," Lorcan said. "Not if we go round the front."

"They'll see us go through the gate," James pointed out.

Lysander grinned. "Not if we don't _go_ through the gate. Come on!"

The twins jumped to their feet, and James followed only a moment behind as they led the way to the fence, pulling aside a bush to reveal a hole just large enough to slip through.

"We used to sneak out through here to go play in the woods. Mum found out, but she didn't bother to fix it cause she says it'll bring the gnomes in faster."

As quietly as they could, they crept up the hill towards the bright lights of the party. It felt strange to hear the sounds of the other children playing and talking just behind the fence in the lights of the garden while the three of them made their way in darkness and silence.

James liked that feeling.

When they finally reached the tower, it took a little jostling and hushed argument before all three of them had a good view of the brightly lit room. Everyone inside was dressed smartly in dark colours, and no-one looked particularly cheerful.

"Doesn't look like much of a party…" James muttered.

"Shush!"

"What are they saying? Open the window a crack…"

"They'll hear us!"

"No they won't."

As Lysander pulled open the window, they heard the distinctive ring of a wine glass being tapped.

"Could everyone be quiet, please?" A voice from out of sight asked.

"Mum," both the twins said simultaneously.

The adults inside gradually fell silent, and the movements of the crowd stilled.

"Thank you," Luna said. "Could I ask for a minute's silent remembrance?"

A number of those inside bowed their heads or shut their eyes. James peered around, marvelling at the change in the people he had thought he knew best. Grandpa Weasley stared straight at the floor, his face holding no trace of a smile. Teddy's usually bright face grew stormy, and he held tightly onto a chair as his hair flushed black. James's mum gazed into the distance without focussing, looking close to tears, and next to her, his dad –

His dad looked right back at him, and gave him the tiniest of nods.

"To fallen friends." Luna broke the silence, raising her glass in a toast that everyone echoed.

James backed away from the window, more confused than ever, and stumbled his way back to the garden in silence, feeling somehow both very grown up and very young.

* * *

><p>It was late by the time they returned to the car, the sky a deep, inky black, and Al and Lily quickly fell asleep in the back seat, but James, curiously untired, spent the journey wide awake, staring out of the window at the passing flickers of night.<p>

After the long silent ride, their arrival was a little disorienting, as Lily was carried inside and Al was roused enough to stumble up the stairs to his bedroom. James headed to his own room, sitting on the bed, still wondering about everything he had seen.

It was only when his father arrived, closing the door gently behind him and taking a seat next to James, that James realised he had been waiting for him.

"I suppose you have some questions?" his father asked.

James frowned, not sure where to start.

"Why do we go to that party every year, dad?"

"It's a memorial." Suddenly, his father looked very serious, and the expression made him seem older than usual.

"What do you know about your name, James?"

James frowned. "I was named James after your dad, Grandpa Potter, and Sirius after your godfather." He had known that since forever.

"Is that all you know?"

"And they both died," James added belatedly. "Was the party for remembering them?"

"In a way." His father sighed. "James, have you ever heard the name Voldemort?"

James shivered, remembering the ghost stories.

"Louis said you have to call him You Know Who." He pulled a face. That had always seemed like a silly thing to do.

"You can call him Voldemort if you want," his father said with a smile. "What do you know about him?"

"I heard…" James almost added who from, but he quickly realised that Fred might get in trouble for telling him. "I heard if you say his name three times at midnight then he Apparates behind you and kills you."

"Really?" James's dad laughed, but then he grew serious again. "That's a lie, James. He was a real wizard, a very nasty one. But he's dead now."

James thought about that for a moment before speaking again.

"So why were we at that party?"

His father sighed. "James, Voldemort was evil. A long time ago – before I was even born – he hurt a lot of people, and he scared a lot more into helping him. He only liked wizards, and he thought that only wizards whose parents could do magic too were any good."

"That's silly!" James had plenty of Muggle friends at school, and he knew that Rose and Hugo's grandparents were both Muggles, but his Aunt Hermione could do _anything_.

"I know that and you know that, but he thought it was true, and he wanted to hurt anyone who could do magic whose parents had been Muggles. A lot of brave people tried to stop him, and he hurt them too. That made some people too scared to stand up to him, and so he kept hurting more and more people."

James frowned. "So what stopped him?"

"One night, when I was a baby –"

"Like Lily?"

"No, a real baby, only a year old. One night, Voldemort decided to attack my parents – Grandma and Grandpa Potter. They were very brave, James. They had fought him before, and they fought him again."

"So they killed him?"

His father frowned and shook his head.

"Voldemort was very powerful and very cruel. He killed them, James."

James shook and leant against his father. Grandma and Grandpa Potter had been killed. When his father was still a baby. He couldn't help but imagine his own parents being killed, and suddenly the world felt like a huge and scary place.

"But they were very brave and very lucky, and they managed to hurt Voldemort. Badly enough that he had to go into hiding, and a lot of people thought he was dead."

"But he came back?"

James's dad nodded. "He came back, and he started hurting people again."

"When?"

"When I was still at Hogwarts, about as old as Teddy is now. He…" His father paused for a second. "Voldemort killed someone I knew at school."

James shivered again. It was strange trying to imagine his father so young, but stranger still imagining a full grown wizard attacking someone Teddy's age. Why would anyone…?

"He tried to take over the country again, and for a little while he managed it. It took a lot of brave people fighting very hard to finally get rid of him for good."

Something in his father's voice made James pause.

"You were one of them, weren't you?"

That thought was even stranger, someone Teddy's age having to fight, but his father nodded.

"Me, and your mother, and your aunts and uncles, and your grandparents. Neville and Luna. Teddy's grandparents. Most of the people we knew had to fight him, James. But they weren't the only ones."

Another pause. James wondered for a second what it was his father was so reluctant to tell him.

"A lot of good people died fighting him. People we knew. That's why we have the parties, James – to remember them."

James remembered something. "Your godfather? Sirius?"

"Yes."

"Who else?" James felt like he ought to know.

"Al's namesakes – Albus Dumbledore and Severus Snape, they were both Headmasters at Hogwarts. Teddy's parents – they were called Remus and Nymphadora, they died just after he was born. His grandfather, too – Teddy was named after him. And your Uncle George – he and Fred were twins, like Lorcan and Lysander."

Every name sent a shiver of fear down James's spine. How had he never realised all this before? So many people he would have known had died before he had been born. In that moment, he hated Voldemort for stealing them from his life.

"So you have the party to celebrate winning?"

"No," his father said slowly. "The party is to remember everyone we lost. That's why we hold it in June – the anniversary of the night Voldemort returned."

"When he killed the person at Hogwarts?"

"Cedric Diggory." His father nodded. "We wouldn't want a party to celebrate killing Voldemort. It was still sad that he had to die, even though he'd hurt so many people. Besides, your cousin Victoire was born on that anniversary. So we celebrate every day just by being alive and happy and safe."

James hugged his father tight, and didn't let go for a long minute.

"Now," his father said quietly, "I don't want to hear anything about you scaring Al and Lily with this, okay? When they're old enough to know, they can ask me themselves. I'm trusting you here, James."

James nodded seriously. "I won't say anything."

He didn't want to tell Al or Lily anyway. This was grown up business.

"Now go on, get to sleep." James's father got to his feet. "You must be tired."

"Okay." James yawned, and suddenly he realised that it was very late. "Night night dad. Love you."

His father paused in the doorway, and for a second there was a look on his face that James couldn't place.

"I love you too."


End file.
